I like Spam. A lot.

OK so I don’t really like the canned meat product. But the touring production of Monty Python’s Spamalot was sure tasty. Taking its cue from the movie, Monty Python and the Holy Grail, this show delivered some of the classic humor any child of the 70s remembers. That was expected.

What wasn’t expected was the savvy send-up of Broadway musicals. Monty Python irreverence was used to make fun of just about everyone and everything on Broadway. No one can a make a mean joke like the Monty Python crew. And the reason those sometimes cruel jokes work so well is that we never question the intention—we somehow know that each and every comic dagger is thrown with a little affection.

The Broadway parodies begin early with the appearance of the leading lady, The Lady of the Lake. She represents a musical theater mash up of divas from Cats, to Phantom, to Beauty and the Beast, and to just about any other Broadway diva you can name. The fun continues when we discover that “You Won’t Succeed on Broadway” if you haven’t any Jews. And Sir Lancelot comes out of the closet in a flashy, gay spectacle.

Don’t get me wrong. I like many of the shows that Spamalot skewers. But they can be sappy, and predictable, and just downright stupid—giving the Monty Python crew plenty to lambast. But hidden within the comic critique, as with most Monty Python satire, is a hint of love; a sense that the creators may harbor a soft spot for the sappiness, the predictability, and even the stupidity that is sometimes Broadway.

I wanna play.

I first heard about The Game in a New York Times article about the New York Fringe Festival. No one expects Utah to produce anything interesting enough to make it to Fringe so the Times called it out with an air of disbelief.

Recently returned from a successful run at Fringe NY (two of four shows sold out), The Game made its way to the Larimar Center for the Performing Arts at Rowland Hall St. Marks School. (I didn’t even know this place existed.) The show included members of the Rowland Hall St. Marks Dance Company.

Here’s the idea: a bunch of dancers; no choreography; “variety show antics;” lots of improvisation. Combine it all together in hopes of creating a one-of-a-kind dance performance. And oh yeah, one dancer wins in the end by proving him or herself in the evening’s activities.

The result was pretty dang good, thanks in large part to some impressive dancing from some young performers. I was most impressed with the men. I may have seen some of these dancers at a past Pickle Company performance, but they weren’t as good then as they were in The Game. Jersey Rio Riemo stole much of the show with beautiful, controlled movement. He “won” in the end. But Juan Aldape and Graham Brown were also good. Even Chris DelPorto, who obviously comes from the martial arts world, was fun to watch. (Although the slow motion, roundhouse power kicks got old fast.)

Sure, a few scenes dragged on to tedium and some performances felt forced or gimmicky. But overall it was a fun show and served as a reminder that experimental dance is alive and well in Salt Lake City.

Demolition Derby crashes.

I’ll admit it, I don’t like programmatic dance. You know; dances that waste too much effort telling stories rather than delivering artistic dance performances. So maybe it isn’t surprising that I didn’t much care for Erik Stern’s Demolition Derby.

Sitting through the performance felt more like watching a public service announcement for Alzheimer’s than experiencing contemporary dance. There was enough dialogue for the performance to qualify as a college lecture. And a dry lecture at that. I’ve questioned this before but it’s worth repeating here, “What’s up with everyone asking dancers to deliver lines?” The dancers are seldom good at it and it just distracts them from dancing. Maybe it’s time to shut up and dance.

You may think I’m exaggerating about the PSA-like nature of this presentation. But at a panel discussion afterwards, the choreographer announced that the show will be traveling to New York City for a future performance. And guess who’s sponsoring the whole deal? A large pharmaceutical company about to release a new Alzheimer’s drug. Seriously, have the drug companies taken over the world?

Lest you think I’m just being snarky, I should say that the performance was not all bad. The music was great. The soundtrack was a combination of recorded and live music. The live music was original and performed by the composers, Aaron Chavez and Thomas Priest. It's amazing how much musical variation can be generated from a percussionist and a guy with a piano and a bassoon. Mr. Chavez gets extra points for some nifty marimba work and a dazzling performance on the hubcaps.

But even superior music couldn’t elevate the rest of the performance to greatness. And in the end, “demolition derby” is an accurate description of a show that's obvious and little banged up.

It's kick ball season.

After a scorching hot summer, nothing makes me happier than the arrival of the kick ball league. My bedroom looks out over Herman Franks field. And while the ball fields are home to little leaguers for most of the spring and summer, the kick ballers arrive in late August, signaling a change in the seasons.

The kick ball league is pure silliness. Uniforms consist of an official league t-shirt with a change in color to identify different teams. Teams are generally a hodgepodge of hipsters, geeks, athletes, and parents with kids in tow. This last group a strange reversal of the little league crowd with parents in the stands and kids on the field.

Then there’s the game itself, with its over-sized bouncy red ball. People, adults in particular, just look goofy knocking around a big red ball. And that’s OK. Because it’s obvious everyone in the league is there for the good time.

This year, the powder blue team upped the ante sporting short shorts and striped tube socks worn high—a strange throwback to the basketball uniforms of the 70s. As if kick ball didn’t already make me smile. The new uniforms made me giggle out loud.

Thanks Kick Ball League for making the neighborhood a little more fun. And I’m cheering for the short shorts.

A dang good art start.

I promise this is it. I’ll quit boring you with details from the Denver Art Museum. And I’ll try to keep this short. But I just had to say that the museum has a decent start on 20th and 21st century art collections. And since I gravitate towards the newer artists, this makes me happy.

Here’s why I was impressed with the contemporary collection. I always have a list of artists that I’ve never seen in person, but that I would like to see in person. I enjoy going to a museum and discovering they have works by artists on my list. Usually, it’s at the big museums that you find these works. But Denver knocked four artists off my list.

I’ll start with Kiki Smith. I already mentioned her as part of the RADAR post but DAM also has a large Kiki Smith bronze in its permanent collection. Number two on the list is Antony Gormley’s Quantum Cloud XXXIII a picture of which is included in my post about the DAM’s architecture. Gormley’s work was shown in a gallery with works by Robert Smithson and Sol Lewitt.

Third on my list is Richard Serra. Granted, the work by Serra (Basic Maintenance) was comparatively small weighing in at a paltry six tons. But the fact that this work was so small for the artists makes me even more interested in seeing his larger rolled steel works. Basic Maintenance is held in place simply by the angles and weight of the steel slabs. A member of the museum staff told me that the floor of the gallery had to be strengthened to accommodate the sculpture.

And just across from Richard Serra was a work by the fourth artist knocked off my list Anish Kapoor. Here again the sculpture was small compared with much of Kapoor’s art but it had plenty of his hallmarks; shiny surfaces; shapes that played with reflections; highly refined metal work.

I guess you could say I lost my art virginity four times at DAM.

Dear Vicki and Ken, Can we be friends.

Recently on display at the Denver Art Museum (DAM) was RADAR, contemporary work from the collection of Vicki and Kent Logan. First of all, who are these people? And how do I get invited to a dinner party at their house? The staff at DAM are obviously buddying up to Vicki and Ken and for good reason. This stuff has gotta go somewhere when they die and it might as well be DAM. (Several works were already listed as fractional gifts and promised to museums including DAM and SFMOMA.)

Because DAM won’t let you take pictures of works on loan I’ve had to pilfer images from other sources. So they may not reflect an accurate installation view. The catalog from the show is worth the $40 and since the exhibit closed on July 15, it’s a great way to experience the art.

There was some great stuff in this show starting with the work that greets you just outside the gallery. Let’s call it a cover of Robert Indiana’s iconic LOVE sculptures. Created by Jason Middlebrook and titled The Beginning of the End, the work takes everything that makes Indiana's original great and turns it on its head, reminding us that even love is temporal.

Entering the gallery you run head on into Michael Joo’s Headless, a mash-up of Buddhist and American traditions. A small army of headless Buddhas sit below the suspended heads of western pop icons, from Wolverine to one of the Seven Dwarfs. I still don't know what it means but I sure did like it.

And the exhibit just gets better from there. A mini Damien Hirst retrospective features three works including Philip (The Twelve Disciples), a 1994 work that features a bull’s head in a metal and glass tank filled with formaldehyde. No matter how you feel about Hirst’s work, I dare you to stand in front of this piece and not react emotionally.

Three works by Khatarina Fritsch (Dealer, Monk, Doctor) were displayed together to dazzling and ominous effect. Ron Mueck’s Untitled (Man under Cardigan) featured the artist’s trademark realism in a smallish sculpture that made you want to reach out and comfort the poor little guy. Two large sculptures by Thomas Schütte cast in “seawater resistant aluminum” (whatever that is) were shiny and showy and slippery.

But wait, there’s more. This post could go on for days talking about all the interesting art in just this one gallery, from the works of Felix Gonzales-Torres to brilliant works by contemporary Asian artists like the Luo Brothers, Yue Minjun, and Zhang Huan.

Kiki Smith’s life-sized bronze, Virgin Mary was hauntingly beautiful and the first large scale work by the artist I’ve seen in person. The more of Smith’s work I see, the more I like the humanity that comes through so forcefully in her art. (And DAM has another of her large bronze works in the permanent collection.)

There’s no time to talk about every work in the exhibit but I’ll close with the art of Takashi Murakami. I’ve always liked stuff by the man behind “superflat.” And this exhibit offers four large-scale works that are just dazzling. May Satzuki, a huge pink painting with white milky splashes across it, was set as the backdrop for Hiropon, a larger-than-life anime inspired sculpture that features lactating breasts. The two works were fantastic together. Super Nova took the concept of the mushroom cloud to new heights of cuteness and terror. The mini Murakami festival rounded out with DOB in a Strange Forest, a substantial sculpture that makes one wonder, “where do Vicki and Ken put this thing when it’s not in a museum?”

There was plenty more to see at this show but I’ve gone on long enough. If you’re ever in the neighborhood let me know and I’ll let you browse through the exhibit catalog. And seriously; Ken, Vicki, call me. We’ll do lunch.

Next post, musings on DAM’s permanent collection.

I [heart] frogs.

Despite a corny name (Toadally Frogs), the current exhibit at the Utah Museum of Natural History is cool. Who doesn’t love frogs? And the selection now on display will make you love them even more.

From bright green tree frogs to big bumpy toads, the cases are filled with engaging characters. My favorites were the miniature poison dart frogs. Tiffany’s and Cartier have nothing on these gem-like creatures. And their sparkling names only add to their appeal. The Bumble-Bee Dart Frog takes its name from its startling yellow and black color scheme. The Terrible Dart Frog glimmers with a greenish gold glow. And the Blue Dart Frog is obviously blue with a name sure to make the older kids snicker.

For good measure, the curators added a tank full of Suriname Toads. With their lidless black eyes and taste buds on their fingertips, these are some of the ugliest, creepiest creatures I’ve ever seen.

The accompanying educational displays are sometimes boring and poorly produced. But that doesn’t matter when the stars of the show are so dang cool.

DAM it! Denver may be cooler than SLC.

While in the mile high city for a business convention, I took a few hours to visit the new expansion to the Denver Art Museum (DAM). After reading the reviews and seeing so many photographs, I thought I might feel a little “been there done that” upon seeing the building designed by Daniel Libeskind. But the experience was anything but ordinary.

The building was more organized than I expected. Reviews and photographs left an impression that DAM is a bit crazy. But standing in front of the angular building I was surprised by how “at home” it felt in downtown Denver. And in the spirit of Frank Gehry’s belief that architecture should be a good neighbor, the expansion embraces and mimics the surrounding structures in unexpected ways.

The building has its problems. Significant repairs are underway to solve a leaky roof. Although the building opened less than one year ago, the outside façade is currently torn apart, with cranes and workmen hovering like insects caring for their alien queen. And much of the interior space is shut down to allow for the repairs.

However, the inside of the building proved to be a better space for viewing art than reviews would suggest. While there are some tragic display choices that are a result of the architecture’s strange angles and pathways, those same characteristics also create opportunities for beautiful presentations. On the bad side is a two-monitor video work by Bill Viola hung just outside the entrance to the third floor gallery. The cramped hallway didn’t allow you to move back far enough to take in the work comfortably. And the traffic in and out of the gallery meant that no matter where you stood, you were always in the way. This might be fine for a painting. But considering the slow, contemplative nature of Viola’s work the interruptions were frustrating. On the good side was Antony Gormley’s Quantum Cloud XXXIII. The work was stunning in the angular gallery on the fourth floor. And the natural light from the nearby window only added to the work’s emotion.

In the end, DAM succeeds. Denver has taken a serious step forward on the trail to becoming a great American city. I wish Salt Lake City would take note. Great architecture makes great cities.

Look for future posts on the contents of the new building.